Police See Need For Higher-Powered Weaponry

By |December 20, 2005

In 1997, two bank robbers wearing body armor and brandishing automatic weapons got into a shootout with police in North Hollywood, Ca. When it was over, says the Miami Herald, 11 police officers and six civilians had been wounded. Police departments across the nation began issuing semiautomatic weapons and body armor to their officers. Ralston Davis, accused of killing three people, was arrested i Broward County, Fl., this month with a knock-off version of the high-powered AR-15 rifle. Deputies said that if Davis hadn’t run out of ammunition, he could have easily picked them off before they could take him out with their handguns, .45-caliber Glocks.

”My second day on the road, I was getting shot at with a high-powered weapon, and I couldn’t shoot back with my handgun,” said former Ft. Lauderdale officer Jim Decker said. “And, what’s worse, the bad guys are training themselves so they can shoot better.” One survey showed that 79 percent of the people who killed officers practiced at the range at least once a month. The National Association of Police Organizations, based in Washington, D.C., supports arming officers with high-powered rifles, saying the weapons are a tool, rarely used, but vital for the well-being of the public and for law enforcement.

The legislation marks a major change for Republicans, who long hve embraced a law-and-order rallying cry. Now many GOP senators argue for rehabilitating more offenders rather than long-time incarceration.

An Arizona doctor argues that the government should have learned from previous federal anti-drug strategies that blanket prohibition doesn’t work. He calls for scrapping attempts to curtail opioids and replacing it with “harm reduction” policies.

Expensive medications for inmates can lead to substandard care and delays in treatment, and that may have lasting—even deadly—consequences for incarcerated individuals, writes a prison health care advocate.

Murder rates in the nation’s 30 largest cities are projected to fall by nearly 6 percent this year according to the latest data, undercutting claims that the nation is experiencing a “crime wave,” says the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law.

School safety commission proposes ending a federal guideline telling schools not to punish minorities at higher rates. The panel largely sidestepped issues relating to guns, although it favors arming some school personnel.